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Saturday 21 June 2008

Keyboard shortcut of the week: a few for Firefox

Here are a few keyboard shortcuts for Firefox to mark the release of version 3 of that browser (which I express my initial opinions about at the bottom of this post). These should all work in Windows and Linux, for Apple Macs simply substitute the Ctrl key with the Cmd key.

Full screen mode
To hide the menus, toolbars and status bar press the F11 key, press it again to go back to windowed mode.

Text Size
To increase the size of text on a page, either hold down the Ctrl and press the + key or, if you have a wheel mouse, hold down Ctrl and roll the wheel upwards. Unsurprisingly, to decrease the size of text on a page, either hold down the Ctrl and press the - key or, if you have a wheel mouse, hold down Ctrl and roll the wheel downwards. To restore the text size to normal hold down Ctrl and press 0 (zero).

Select the search box
To move the cursor to the search box, either the built in one or the first one on a toolbar, hold down Ctrl and press K (I am not sure of the significance of K here - so probably not that easy to remember)

I have already published posts that detailed other keyboard shortcuts for Firefox:

Quickly open link in a new tab - without losing focus on current tab
Opening the Find box - near the bottom of this general post
A previous selection of shortcuts - for navigating between tabs, opening new tabs, closing tabs, opening bookmarks and selecting the address bar.
How to refresh the page

My initial feelings about version 3

I have been using Firefox v3 for a few days now and don't have much to report. It has crashed twice in that time, but the 'Restore last session' feature means that this is not such a disaster. It does not seem particularly quicker and I have yet to find any new features that have excited me. On the downside it still seems to 'Not respond' a little too often and memory management is still far from perfect.

For Entrecard users there is a problem with the way that it handles cookies. If you switch between Entrecard accounts you will keep being told to login again. I have posted a workaround solution on the Entrecard forums here - rest assured the boffins at ecard are working on it.

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for this Info bro!! I am newbie firefox user. Linked you to my blog. http://suplado.info, Hope you could link me too.

Anonymous said...

I have been using FF for a while now, but I didn't know about the F11 key thingy. Thanks very much!

Anonymous said...

I have to say that so far I haven't been too impressed with FireFox 3. Like you mentioned, it seems to be a lot less stable than the previous version (crashes alot). I also don't like the "suggested" sites that appear in the history bar when typing a URL.

Hopefully it's just minor bugs that can be worked out, because FF is my favorite browser, hands down. Keep those tips coming!

Anonymous said...

Good tips I'll have to check out. I decided the other day I am never using IE again :)

jezee12 said...

I agree FF3 is nothing to write home about although there are a few new features.
I find full screen mode handy and increasing the text size is also very good, even though these were available in the old version.
What I have found quite frustrating is that some of my old add-ons don't work in the FF3. For example Tab browser preferences which was a great app, however I have found a replacement called Tab mixer plus which is even better.
Regards

Follow me on Twitter at http://twitter.com/infoaddicts

Anonymous said...

So glad you mentioned the crashing and login problems with entrecard. I was starting to fear it was my computer LOL

DJYano said...

Good post. Some shortcuts help me a lot. Thanks

Anonymous said...

I have always used firefox . However never used firefox 3

Anonymous said...

Nice info.
just got trouble upgrading to FF3. Some sites aren't showed correctly.
I had to uninstall it then reinstall FF3. It's fine now.
Thanks alot for the tips :)

Never Surrender said...

Hey just checking out a few post from the sites I have on my respected sites blog list from my blog http://dailyfreesoftware.blogspot.com
and I also dropped my entercard. Anyways thanks for the shortcuts of the week, I like the f11 shortcut, im going to use that one alot.
Thanks again
juzten
Daily Free Software

Borkiman said...

Thank you all for your comments...

sup: I only link to computer themed sites from here, although I am considering adding a blogroll listing blogs with other themes... watch this space...

m777: I was also underwhelmed by the new Firefox, but it is still much better than IE (I'm sure Chelle agrees)

js: Most of my old addons have now been updated for FF3... those that haven't been updated I have found replacements for...

L. Venkata Subramaniam said...

The firefox tips you have given are very useful!

Yup the best thing about firefox is the restore last session feature :) These days I even shut down my computer without bothering to bookmark some of my sessions.

Anonymous said...

Nice tips. Thanks for sharing

Anonymous said...

I have had that problem with the entrecard toolbar. I think I am going to check out crome and see what the fuss is all about

Borkiman said...

IVS, DD & DN: thanks for the comments